An approach for flexible manipulator obstacle avoidance by means of spheres of influence

An approach for path planning and end-point control for an orbiting 2-link flexible manipulator, with a specified target and several arbitrarily positioned obstacles is proposed. The presence of link vibrations makes the problem more challenging. The problem involves generation of regions (contours) representing spheres of influence around the finite size obstacles, with various degrees of permissible penetrations during path planning to the target. Penalty functions are assigned to satisfy pre-defined performance specifications. Effectiveness of the collision avoidance scheme is illustrated through numerical simulation runs.